Tomlinson Professor of Political Theory, McGill University, blogging about political theory, political science, academic life, books, geekstuff, and coffee.

Wednesday, January 03, 2007

What I'll be doing this semester

Borrowing a blogging idea from Brad De Long, since I enjoy it when he does it.

Political Science 613: Hume, Smith, and the Scottish Enlightenment

This is a graduate seminar on the political and moral thought of David Hume and Adam Smith, and as a secondary matter on their contemporaries and intellectual context in the Scottish Enlightenment as well as in France. It aims to convey, through close readings of primary texts, supplemental readings of secondary texts, discussion, and a research paper, both a broad understanding of the intellectual currents of the Scottish Enlightenment, and at least a moderately deep grasp of Hume and Smith. The most important themes of the course will include justice and sympathy; the theory of commercial society and its development; the relationship between private morality and public benefit; the critique of 17th-century contractarianism; and Hume’s and Smith’s contributions to political economy and political science as descriptive and explanatory disciplines.

Francis Hutcheson, An Essay on the Nature and Conduct of the Passions and Affections, with Illustrations on the Moral Sense, Aaron Garrett ed., Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 2002 [1728], pp. 22-9, 110-137

Francis Hutcheson, An Inquiry Into the Original of Our Ideas of Beauty and Virtue in Two Treatises, Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 2004 [1725], pp. 85-134

April 15: Special Montreal Political Theory Workshop daylong symposium on Hume and Smith, with papers by Samuel Fleischacker, Sharon Krause, Sankar Muthu, and Andrew Sabl.

Core recommended secondary reading:

Alexander Broadie, ed., The Cambridge Companion to the Scottish EnlightenmentAthol Fitzgibbons, Adam Smith's System of Liberty, Wealth, and VirtueSamuel Fleischacker, Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations: A Philosophical CompanionCharles Griswold, Adam Smith and the Virtues of EnlightenmentKnud Haakonssen, The Science of a LegislatorKnud Haakonssen, Natural Law and Moral PhilosophyKnud Haakonssen, ed., The Cambridge Companion to Adam SmithIstvan Hont, Jealousy of TradeIstvan Hont and Michael Ignatieff, eds., Wealth and Virtue: The Shaping of Political Economy in the Scottish EnlightenmentJohn Stewart, Opinion and Reform in David Hume’s Political Philosophy

Science of a Legislator, Wealth and Virtue, and Philosophical Companion should be considered just shy of being required reading to finish befor the end of the semester.